Hola! Soy Flor y esta es mi historia.
Hi, I’m Florencia, and this is the story that found me.
Before the Water Touches the Leaves
A few years ago tea began to become a part of my life. Even though I had always enjoyed drinking tea and would use (or invent) any excuse to visit the tea shop in my city and treat myself to a new tea, it wasn’t until 2020 that, in the middle of a professional and vocational crisis, I decided to go all in and start studying what was behind those brews I loved so much.
That year I began the beautiful and endless journey of becoming a tea taster, a path I’m still walking today, slowly and carefully.
After taking the basic tea culture and tasting course, the only thing I knew was that I knew nothing. And so, without really deciding it but fully convinced that it was what I loved, I slowly started to transform my profession and my vocation. One day, without even realizing it, I found myself stepping into my very first tea field in Argentina. For three days we harvested, processed, and lived surrounded by tea in Misiones, one of my country’s tea-producing provinces. After that experience, I understood that what I wanted was to be in the fields, surrounded by nature and tea plants.
The second time I went there, another plot twist happened: after that trip, I became part of the instructor staff of the academy, Pei Chen Tea Palace, where I had trained—the same one that organized the trips. And that’s how in 2022 I went from being a student to being a tasting instructor and guide for the tea-production trips to Misiones.
That same year, I took the leap and launched my own tea brand, blending Argentine teas of different varieties (green, wulong, red, and white) with flowers. That’s how Yvoty Infusiones was born.
Around the same time, I also immersed myself in Taiwanese tea ceremony and the gentle foundations of Chinese medicine — practices that taught me to see tea not only as a drink, but as a way of listening, healing, and being present.
One day I had to make a difficult decision: stay in my country working as an instructor and investing in my project, or open myself to discovering the world. And once again life pushed me out of my comfort zone and into traveling. So in 2024 I moved to Australia to work and live there. Even though I was excited to experience something new, it was very hard to say goodbye to what I loved. In Australia I worked in a winery, a macadamia factory, and a jojoba nursery. Every time I learned something about new production processes (for some reason always related to the food and beverage industry), all I could think about was how to apply that knowledge to tea processing. I also contacted every tea farm in Australia to see if they needed an extra pair of hands. Although I didn’t get a job, I managed to visit one of the farms—which, coincidentally, had all Japanese cultivars.
Until one day a new opportunity appeared: Obubu opened its internship applications. I had nothing to lose, so I applied—not with great expectations, but with a deep desire to find myself in the tea fields again, but this time in Japan. It felt so far away and yet so magical that I decided to believe. And one day I received the email everyone hopes for: Welcome to Obubu Tea Farms.
Under the autumn sun at Obubu
I still remember the day I stepped off that plane and set foot on the land of the rising sun — I could hardly believe it. Everything felt beautiful, magical, and surreal, and it still feels that way to me even now. The colours, the nature inhabiting every corner, the generosity of the people.
Arriving in Wazuka on the first day and seeing where I was going to live for the next three months still felt like part of a dream.
What followed after that were thousands of adventures — but not just any kind of adventures, tea adventures. Going to the fields, weeding, harvesting, drinking tea, visiting the tencha factory, packing tea, drinking tea, preparing lunch, welcoming people from all around the world who, just like I did when I first started this path, want to know what tea is and where it comes from. Guiding the tea tours, drinking tea, helping in the shop, recommending Obubu teas, tasting them to get to know them better and make better recommendations, tasting teas from other regions of Japan and the world, talking with people, understanding the challenges Japan is facing regarding tea production. The tea ware, mochi, dorayaki workshops, drinking tea, taking the JTB classes, working on my intern project, learning how to make traditional handmade tea, processing our own tea in the Sencha factory, making our own Wakoucha, drinking tea, learning how to use the roasting machine, cleaning, organising, rearranging, preparing… drinking tea, drinking tea, and drinking tea. These are some of the things I did during my internship. I’m surely forgetting some, but I can say with certainty that I lived the full experience — from the field to the cup.
And that is what I carry with me: having lived first-hand everything that happens on a tea farm, every aspect that makes it what it is and makes it unique. I also carry with me the love everyone pours into this work, and how tea can gather people who truly love this beverage.
For me, tea has always meant union and sharing. Just like “mate”, the drink we enjoy so much in Argentina, tea brings friends together, brings family together, and brings us back to ourselves. And now I can also say that tea has helped me meet wonderful and passionate people.
My mission: Bring argentinian mate to Japan xD
Kyobancha mate
The Aftertaste That Stays With You
It’s hard to talk about what’s ahead in a world that is constantly changing.
If you ask me today, I would say that my dream is to live in the countryside, surrounded by trees and tea plants, processing tea. To grow my own food, have a vegetable garden, and live among fruit trees. To honor the people I love with a cup of tea.
To sit and contemplate what nature offers us, the fire, the movement of the leaves dancing with the wind, the water flowing through the river.
There is so much within the world of tea that sometimes it’s simply about breathing, preparing your favorite tea, and sitting down to contemplate this infinite world.
with love, Flor